"Carousel" genre: Acoustic
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	Slow acoustic ballad with sentimental leanings. Dealing with loss & longing, it hopefully will tug at your heart.
	CD: none...yet   Label: only available here! Credits: D.Phillips
	Story Behind the Song Inspired by a recent vacation with my 82 year old Grandfather, in which he shared many stories of his youth. Having lost his wife, my grandmother, of 64 years in July of 1999; he has felt empty and lost alot of the time. This trip was special in that we went to his hometown of Meridian, MS...which was her hometown as well. He told me of how they met, where they went, what they did. He spoke of a carousel i nthe city park, that was built in 1909 I believe. It was an indoor wooden built carousel, and they used to have dances in the building alongside it. This was a favorite meeting spot for them, and a place they would eventually take my father as a child to ride the carousel. He spoke of how he'd always ride the lion and Grandma would ride the white horse next to him. We made a special side trip to this carousel, which is still operational. We all took 50 cent rides, and sure enough, Gramps got on his lion once again. This inspired the entire song. When we returned from this trip, I had the idea of writing a song to try and capture how he feels. Having just purchased a new acoustic/electric ( A Godin A6 by the way), I began strumming and as happens so often, a little passage started taking form. Immediately I jotted the first line that came to me..."When I hold Out My Hand"...and really that's all I had. The melody stuck in my head all ninght and the next day, so I set up in the attic to lay it down using cool edit pro so that I would not forget it. IT is essentially a simple tune, nothing too technical at all, and was written on the fly. I needed a solo section or a bridge or something extra, and as I started to play over the major A dropping to the natural 7th, I realized that I was more or less playing "Dixie". This floored me, as obviously my Grandparents are certainly southern born and bred. So the idea came to throw that in to "surprise" the listener, and as a personal tribute to them. Lyrically, I had to work at getting the right lyric, and I still will probably change them and redo the vocals. You can hear mistakes in this version because it really isn't properly finished. But Iwas so enthused with it that I had to post it so my family could hear it! When I had gotten the music all in order, and listening to the last playback before calling it a night...the line of "Ride The Carousel Again With Me" came out of thin air. Which fit the song because the idea of riding a carousel with someone mirros the idea of living with someone all your life facing all of life's moments together. The actual carousel in Mississippi didn't cross my mind at that time. A few moments later it really hit me how appropriate using the Carousel as the center piece to the tune was. Given my Grandfather's emotional attachment to that particular ride, and the expression on his face as we road it again....well, it almost seemed like I was given that line to use from some other entity. It certainly ties the song together..and gives a strong emotional pull to it...and in the end that's where he wants to be... I used Cool Edit Pro software utilizing several guitar tracks all using the Godin A6. I used a Yamaha keyboard PSR 640 I think, to add a little clarinet in the background, and to play a fretless bass part. Vocals are straight into a TASCAM 4-track using a Shure SM58...there are no effects. The idea at the end isn't complete. I recorded the carousel ride we took in Meridian with a video camera. The old time Carousel music was playing the whole while. I want to fade out the massive vocal harmony section at the end while fading in the actual Carousel music. I think that will really top off the project. I also cut and snipped the ending harmony and put it as a fade up to start the song. The jury is still out on that! I hope people enjoy it. I know that it brought a tear to my eye as I was recording it..and since music is emotion, it achieves it's desired effect without trying Lyrics WHEN I REACH OUT MY HANDS CAN YOU FEEL MY FINGERTIPS THERE WAS NOTHING AS GRAND AS THE SMILE ACROSS YOUR LIPS I'M WAITING FOR THE CHANCE IN ARM IN ARM WE'LL DANCE IN MAGNOLIA'S ROMANCE TO HAVE YOU BY MY SIDE ETERNALLY RESIDE TO RIDE THE CAROUSEL WITH ME AGAIN WHEN THE TEARS FILL MY EYES OF THE MEMORIES TOO DEEP THE DREAMS SEEM SO ALIVE THAT I LONG TO STAY ASLEEP JUST LIKE A LONG LOST TRAIN TO SMILE ON THROUGH THE PAIN SEEK SUNSHINE IN THE RAIN UNTIL YOU'RE BY MY SIDE AND ALL MY FEARS SUBSIDE TO RIDE THE CAROUSEL WITH ME AGAIN RIDE THE CAROUSEL WITH ME TOGETHER FOR ETERNITY, TOGETHER FOR ETERNITY RIDE THE CAROUSEL , AND BE LIKE WE USED TO BE TO FEEL YOUR WARM EMBRACE ENHANCED BY SOUTHERN GRACE AND RIDE THE CAROUSEL, OUR SPECIAL PLACE THO' MY PRIDE WON'T LET SHOW IT'S SO HARD TO BE ALONE FROM SIXTY-FOUR YEARS AGO LEFT TO FACE EACH DAY UNKNOWN TIL THE DAY WHEN I'LL BE FREE ON MY WAY TO FAMILY BUT DON'T YOU CRY FOR ME CAUSE RIGHT THERE BY MY SIDE MY MISSISSIPPI BRIDE SHE'LL RIDE THE CAROUSEL WITH ME AGAIN RIDE THE CAROUSEL WITH ME TOGETHER FOR ETERNITY…

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